


love and chemical dust

by myrmidryad



Series: Underground Dreaming [2]
Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magic, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Magic, Paris (City), Paris metro, Sleeping Rough, Urban Fantasy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-20
Updated: 2013-10-20
Packaged: 2017-12-30 00:28:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,926
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1011861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/myrmidryad/pseuds/myrmidryad
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A fairly good day in the life of Azelma Thénardier, including helping a Patron-Minette henchman lay groundwork for a big power spell in the Gare du Nord, bleeding for a blood witch who will owe her a favour, and stealing showers and food from her parents with Éponine and Gavroche.</p>
            </blockquote>





	love and chemical dust

**Author's Note:**

> Title from the amazing IAMX song [Oh Beautiful Town](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HyBrwjcQlIY). I encourage you to at least read the lyrics if not listen to the song because they're gorgeous and perfect and very fitting for my idea of the Parisian street magic culture in this universe.

Someone very close by hissed in sudden pain, and Azelma snapped awake and lashed out with a quick fist. It glanced off the shoulder of a bearded man with a sour expression, and she scowled. “Beat it, shitdick.” 

“Bitch,” he muttered, slouching off down the hall. 

Azelma sighed and sat up slowly. She was sick of sleeping on the floor in the abandoned Champ de Mars métro station, but she’d been told to wait here, so wait she would. If Jourdain said she’d get paid for waiting, she would wait. For fifty euros, she’d wait wherever he damn well told her. At least in here it was sheltered from the weather, and she’d lined her pockets with the hex powder Baudet had given her in exchange for keeping a lookout all night while he did some sort of deal with a rich woman from Trocadéro, so pick-pockets like the hobo who’d woken her up wouldn’t get lucky. 

She pulled her phone out of her pocket. It was ten past eight in the morning, according to the display, and she had three texts. Two were from Éponine, but one was from Jourdain, and she sat up straight as she opened it. 

Jourdain: Be outside at ten. 

She didn’t bother replying, and checked the texts from Éponine. 

Éponine: Marie-c’s looking for virgin blood if ur up 4 it. 

Éponine: G says M+D r out 2nite so we cn SHOWER!!! 

Azelma grinned and texted back. 

Azelma: Busy 2day bt cld bleed later? DEFINITELY SHOWER!!! 

The potential of the day just kept rising. Fifty euros, something extra if she bled for Marie-Cécile, and a hot shower tonight. She texted herself a fortune spell for good luck (<fortuna max><:)><max fortuna>) and dug in her pocket for a chocolate bar she’d stolen yesterday. “Here’s to you, kid,” she muttered, unwrapping it and biting in with gusto. Truly, chocolate was the real magic of the world. 

Ten o’clock saw her leaning on the railing around the Champ de Mars entrance, headphones in and eyes open. She didn’t actually have an iPod or an mp3 player, but it made her less likely to be bothered, and she had a couple of spells she liked to work with them from time to time. She only saw Jourdain a second before he walked past, and she followed without a word. He’d speak when he had something to say. 

As they walked up the wide road, she glanced left at the Eiffel Tower, dark grey against the pale morning sky. They weren’t close enough for it to be visible above the trees and buildings as they progressed, leaving behind the grand buildings of the École Militaire and advancing into the tourist trap of overpriced cafés and expensive shops. It was always somewhat disarming to emerge from the Champ de Mars station to one of the richest areas of Paris. From freezing, graffitied tunnels to wide boulevards and a photo opportunity on every corner. 

Jourdain went down the steps to the École Militaire métro station and Azelma dug in her pockets for her Navigo pass. In exchange for her services as a creator of distractions and illegal supplies transporter, she’d managed to get a promise from Gueulemer that he would pay her with a big favour instead of paying her with money. When the jobs were done, she asked for a card with a year’s credit. He’d tried bartering it down, but she’d stood firm and had free travel in the city as a result. That had been one of her better deals. 

Jourdain didn’t speak to her on the train, and she followed him when they switched at Strasbourg St-Denis from the eighth line to the fourth and got off at Gare du Nord. Once they were part of the bustling crowd, he finally fell back and walked beside her, shoulders squared and chapped lips barely moving as he spoke. “Ready for this?” 

“You haven’t told me what we’re doing yet,” she muttered as he led her to a bench and sat down. 

“Taking the nexus for the Patron-Minette.” 

Azelma nodded slowly, suddenly wishing she hadn’t had that chocolate bar. “What’s my role?” 

“Guardian. You work with me, make sure I’m not distracted.” 

“You working the building or the lines?” 

“Both.” Jourdain flashed her a grin with more teeth than humour. “Main gang works the corners, we handle the lines.” 

Azelma kept a blank face to conceal the chill that went up her spine. Montparnasse, Claquesous, Babet, and Gueulemer were all here. If anyone let this slip, it would be the biggest opportunity the police and gendarmerie had ever had to arrest them. “Why was I waiting in Champ de Mars all that time then?” 

“Needed you off the lines while we set it up,” Jourdain explained. “Guardians need to be cleaner, fresher.” 

“But we took the métro here.” 

“Doesn’t matter now. Come on. We start in five minutes.” 

Azelma bit back a remark about cutting it a bit close and followed Jourdain down to the end of the platform. He sat down, took a flattened paper cup out of his pocket, unfolded it, and put it on the floor next to him before dropping a couple of coins into it. Basic prosperity-luck token. Azelma backed up a little and kept her eyes forward like she was waiting for the next train. Hopefully the commuters would be too concerned with getting wherever they were going that they wouldn’t notice the magic being worked right under their noses. 

Plenty of people used the métro to draw energy anyway. They’d probably dismiss whatever Jourdain did as just another beggar trying to pull in a little luck off the line. Just in case though, she pulled her headphones free from under her shirt. There was a neat little knot spell Éponine had shown her when she was younger. She’d learned it from their dad, she said. 

After the point where the cord split in two, Azelma tied a loop knot, imagining herself and Jourdain enclosed inside it, protected in a bubble from the attention of everyone else. “Divert, distract, dissuade,” she murmured. “Unseen, unheard, unnoted. I close the loop and fade. Invisible and unnoticed.” She put the headphones in her ears, closing the circuit and effectively plugging it into her own energy. 

She’d been told at school that magic didn’t work like that, but this spell had always worked for her. 

Good thing too, because she’d never seen a beggar with a smartphone, and Jourdain’s was obviously new. He caught her raised eyebrow and grinned before whoever he’d called picked up. “Yeah, I’m here,” he said quietly. “Just about to lay the seal. Everyone’s ready? Good, good. Yep, got my guardian. What’s your time?” He checked his watch and nodded. “Me too. Okay, one minute.” 

Azelma concentrated on keeping the collective attention of the commuters averted from their little corner while Jourdain pulled a scrap of paper and a large black pen from his pocket. Copying carefully from the paper, he drew a complicated seal on the floor in front of him. Azelma stepped forward to keep it hidden from anyone who happened to glance their way and sneaked a peek while she was at it. It looked like the seal included a simplified map of the station’s métro lines in the centre, surrounded by the usual squiggles and stars and shit that seals usually had. 

She’d never really _got_ seals. Sigils were much easier to use as the root for a spell. But of course, easier to make was easier to break. Still, what sigils lacked in reliability they made up for in versatility, in her opinion. 

Jourdain finished drawing his seal on the floor and called his friend back. “Done,” he muttered. “You? Good, good. Want to count down? Alright, alright, here we go…thirteen, twelve, eleven…” The rails in front of them began to sing, signalling the imminent arrival of a train, and Azelma held her breath. “…six, five, four, three…” The final numbers and Jourdain’s next words (presumably an invocation of some sort) were lost in the noise of the train pulling up to the platform. As it stopped, Azelma heard Jourdain say, “…potestas motus, praegero ops ut in angelorum.” 

 _Latin_. Azelma’s lip curled in disdain and she turned him out. She wondered whose idea it had been to use Latin. Probably Montparnasse – he had a flair for the dramatic, though Babet had probably been the one to put it together. Azelma was pretty sure she knew about ten languages, at least four of them dead. Of the three members of the Patron-Minette she’d met in person, Babet unnerved her the most. The woman was far too clever and far too good at whatever she turned her hand to. Montparnasse she could handle, and Gueulemer was just a brute, but Babet was outright dangerous. 

“Seal’s all set,” Jourdain told his friend. “Circle closed? Yeah, yeah I’ve got it. No problem. Nine minutes.” He hung up and looked at Azelma. “Get comfortable.” 

She nodded and slouched, just another kid loitering on the platform. The train moved off, and she felt the tug of magic go with it. The métro was the lifeblood of Paris, full of restless energy and momentum. Some idiot rivals of the Patron-Minette had tried tapping into it, and it had obviously raised hackles. If the Patron-Minette took the Gare du Nord, a nexus of energy with connections to the fourth and fifth métro lines and the B and D RER lines, not to mention the European lines and the buses, they would gain the upper hand and then some. With influence like that, they’d easily crush the newcomers. 

Politics. Azelma tried to stay out of it as much as possible. She didn’t like being noticed. 

Nine minutes passed and Jourdain pulled a half-full bottle of water from one of his pockets and tipped it over the seal, smudging it away with his boot and grinning at Azelma. “Good job, darling. What say we get a drink?” 

“What say you pay me?” she said, more amused than anything. She didn’t mind Jourdain. He wasn’t the type to try anything on her. 

He laughed and nodded. “Food first – I’m starving.” Understandably – powerful, concentrated magic like that would take it out of a person. 

Azelma nodded and followed him away from the platform, untying the knot in her headphones on the way. They didn’t go up into the main station – that would be asking for trouble – but went down the fifth line to Jacques Bonsergent. Jourdain led her up to the street and along the road to a shabby bistro where he told her to order anything under five euros. She got a coffee, he got pasta, and when she’d finished he gave her fifty euros in cash. 

“Keep your head down,” he told her as she stood up. 

“Always do. Good day, monsieur.” 

“Likewise, mam’selle.” 

 

She had to go back to Gare le Nord to catch the B line out to the suburbs. Marie-Cécile lived out in Bondy, and Éponine was waiting for her at Le Blanc-Mesnil station, slouched against the wall outside with her hood pulled up and a ‘don’t fuck with me’ atmosphere hanging around her. It vanished when she saw Azelma, and she grinned as she came over. 

“Finished your job then?” 

Azelma nodded, and they started to walk. She filled Éponine in on the details as they went, walking down the main road towards Léon Blum Avenue, and the apartment block Marie-Cécile lived in. Like pretty much all of the communes east of the city, it was a shithole. The only halfway decent thing about Marie-Cécile’s place was the bakery on the ground floor of the building, and even then it was a pain to go down and get anything because Marie-Cécile lived on the eighth floor, and the elevator was always broken. 

Of all the things Azelma hated about the suburbs, it was how huge they were. Endless sprawling miles of shitty houses with shitty shops and shitty streets. She and Éponine had to walk for half an hour to get to Léon Blum Avenue – she never had that problem in the city. And she didn’t know her way around so well out here. In the city she could always tell when she was being sized up by a gendarme or a cop, their eyes raking over her afro ponytail and dirty clothes and weighing up whether she was legal or not. Out here, there were fewer white faces, but her judgement was thrown. Like she’d spent so much time tying herself to the city that her balance went off when she left its borders. 

When they got there, Marie-Cécile was waiting on the wall outside, a sour expression on her face. “About fucking time,” she snapped. “Come on, I need blood.” 

“Calm down, vampire,” Azelma snorted. “What’s the hurry?” 

Marie-Cécile led them inside and they began to climb the stairs. “This _bitch_ Ninon tried to get into Gaétan’s pants. I’m going to make her wish she’d never been born.” 

Azelma rolled her eyes at Éponine behind Marie-Cécile’s back, but they followed her up to her little flat and sat on her pristine sofa while she got a knife ready (living in a slum was no reason for low standards, Marie-Cécile always insisted). “You need to set up a circle or something?” Éponine asked. 

“Nah, I’m doing the spell tonight.” 

“Midnight?” 

“Just before. If I time it right, it’ll activate at midnight and the whore’ll get what she deserves.” 

“You ever considered that you’re a bit bloodthirsty?” Azelma asked, smoothing a hand down the fine upholstery. She knew for a fact that Marie-Cécile had gotten it at knock-off price from a guy who employed Maghrebis under the table (another reason she was glad she didn’t live in the suburbs – it was almost impossible to get a legitimate job unless you were white. Not that she’d ever actually had a legitimate job, but it was the _principle_ of the thing). 

“Considered and accepted,” Marie-Cécile snorted, appearing in the doorway and beckoning her into the kitchen. “Come on, I’m not cutting you over the sofa. If blood gets on that I’ll never get it out. A girl needs to fight for her man, Azelma. Fact of life.” 

Azelma rolled her eyes and let Marie-Cécile lead her to the sink where a plain kitchen knife, some tissues, and a plaster were waiting. Marie-Cécile kept her blood knife with the normal cooking knives in case she was searched, and all her other tools were everyday objects at first glance as well. Standard precaution. 

She’d given blood so many times she didn’t even flinch when Marie-Cécile sliced the blade into the side of her palm and held an eggcup underneath to catch it. “Shame you’re not on your period,” she said absently, and Azelma hummed in agreement. Giving blood was so much easier when all you had to do was wring out a tampon. “Ah well. Cheers anyway – I wasn’t going to get any virgin blood around here.” She laughed, and Éponine fought a smile from the doorway. “Stay pure forever, baby girl.” 

“For your dark, nefarious purposes?” Azelma smirked and clenched her fist to force more blood out, the pain sharp and bright. “You don’t even have to ask.” 

“You’re totally making the right choice as well,” Marie-Cécile sighed. “Men are dicks.” 

“Says the girl planning on cursing someone for making a move on her boyfriend,” Éponine said dryly. Marie-Cécile shrugged. 

“Girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do. Okay, that’s plenty.” She swept the eggcup away and covered it with a little square of clingfilm before popping it in the fridge. “That should keep till tonight. You good?” 

“Sure.” Azelma ran the cut under the tap and dried it with a tissue. “Give me five minutes and we’re done.” And by unspoken agreement, Marie-Cécile would owe her a favour. She sure as hell couldn’t afford to pay for the blood, so it would have to be something else. As she and Éponine left, she put it down in her phone so she wouldn’t forget. She had two draft texts: one for favours she owed, one for favours owed to her. She tried to keep the second list longer than the first at all times. 

Éponine slept on the train back into the city, and they went to check on Jehan’s altar in the Grenelle Cemetery to fill the time. “They’re still holed up then?” Azelma asked as they left the Boucicaut station. She didn’t bother concealing the bounce in her step; she was just happy to be back in Paris proper. Éponine nodded. She never seemed to have that problem, Azelma had noticed. Éponine could survive anywhere. 

“Till Evard cools off. That’s what you get for messing up a locating spell.” 

“It’s not like they knew they were messing with it.” 

Éponine shrugged. “Tell that to Evard. He’ll be fine in a week or so, but R should’ve known better than to give a show near Boissiére. Everyone knows that’s Evard’s patch.” 

“Maybe they didn’t?” Azelma shrugged. “Jehan’s pretty green.” 

“Yeah, but R’s not. He should’ve known better.” 

“Good thing they’ve got a bolthole. Evard sent Lily down to Champ de Mars yesterday to see if they were there.” 

“Which Lily? Lily with the hair?” 

“Nah, Lily with the tattoos.” 

“She’s hanging around Evard now?” Éponine sounded surprised. Azelma just shrugged as they turned onto the Rue Saint-Charles. 

“Sure. He beat up her ex for her, remember?” 

Éponine sighed. “Oh yeah. He’s still a dick though.” 

“Preach. Where’s Jehan’s altar?” 

“The back wall, apparently. He asked me to check it yesterday, but I was busy.” 

“What’re we even checking for?” Azelma wrinkled her nose. 

“Damage, interference. See if anything left a message.” 

“Any _thing?_ ” Éponine shrugged, and Azelma shuddered. “Urgh. Necromancers.” 

“I think he prefers the term ‘spirit worker’.” 

“Of course he does.” Azelma rolled her eyes. “Everything’s got to have a fancy name in high magic.” 

“Jehan’s alright.” 

“Yeah, he’s alright, but working with dead shit is just creepy – I don’t care how adorable he is in real life.” 

Éponine laughed, and they were quiet as they walked into the cemetery. It was an odd little place, really. No more than eight hundred graves, at her guess, though it felt like fewer because they were packed so close together. An old boneyard with angel statues and fancy mausoleums surrounded by modern high-rise apartment buildings. The ground was bare dirt, and if not for the lines of trees down the paths between the graves, there wouldn’t have been evidence of any life at all. 

Jehan’s altar was tucked between two graves against the back wall. Azelma admired its simplicity if not its purpose – just a couple of bricks with a large, shallow upturned bowl on top and a couple of tee lights either side. But then Éponine lifted the bowl up and Azelma whirled away, hand flying to her mouth. “Oh my god. Oh my god. Éponine, please tell me that’s not what I think it is.” 

“It’s just a snake skeleton, Zelma.” 

“What the _fuck?_ ” This was exactly why she couldn’t figure Jehan out. One moment he was all rainbows and sunshine, painting his nails and brazenly wearing skirts in public. Then he turned around and set up a bone altar to communicate with dead people. What was _with_ that? 

“Don’t be such a baby.” 

Azelma peeked at the altar and had to look away again, her stomach turning at the sight of the string of white ribs curled in a spiral. “Oh my god. Where the hell did he even _get_ that?” 

“No idea.” Éponine swatted her leg and laughed. “Who cares? You want to leave an offering?” 

“I’m good, thanks.” 

“Suit yourself.” Azelma turned round just enough to see Éponine pull a sweet packet out of her pocket. It had been tied off at one end with a hairband, and whatever was inside was lumpy. Typically, Éponine didn’t warn her before she opened it and tipped a dead mouse onto the top of the bowl. Azelma made a high-pitched sound and started walking quickly back towards the gates. Fuck cemeteries, fuck necromancy, and _fuck_ dead things. She did not sign up for this. She heard Éponine cackling as she hurried away, and hoped spitefully that she’d trip on a gravestone or something. 

Éponine was still grinning when she came out of the cemetery a few minutes later. “You know, Jehan wanted you to check it on your own when I said I couldn’t.” 

Azelma scowled. “I will _kill_ him. See how easy it’ll be for him to chat to dead people then.” 

Éponine nudged her as they walked away. “What if he haunts you though?” 

“I’ll overcome my disgust, dig up his corpse, and punch him in the face.”

 

Gavroche was already stretched out on the sofa when they went to their parents’ apartment, a bowl of crisps within easy reach and a big grin on his face. “Mum’ll be out till eleven-ish,” he told them. “And Dad’s not back till tomorrow.” 

“Have you showered yet?” Éponine asked. 

“Nah.” 

“You’re last then,” Azelma told him, opening the fridge and sighing with relief at the sight of actual food. “Apparently it’s age before beauty tonight.” She grinned at Éponine, who stuck her tongue out before vanishing into the bedroom. It was a one-bed flat – when Gavroche was here, he slept on the sofa. She made herself a sandwich and fell down next to Gavroche. “You need a haircut.” 

“You need some manners,” he retorted. She laughed and took a bite of her sandwich with a happy moan. 

“All I’ve had today is a chocolate bar and a coffee,” she mumbled. 

“Binge while you can,” Gavroche advised, and she nodded. 

She wanted to take her time in the shower, but she needed to leave some hot water for Gavroche as well, so she washed quickly and then just stood under the spray for a few minutes, letting it burn her skin and scald her clean. She shaved her legs in the sink, balancing on one while she shaved the other, and wrapped herself up in her mother’s bathrobe before ceding the bathroom to Gavroche. 

When he was done, they watched _A Knight’s Tale_ , and Éponine combed Azelma’s hair the way their mother used to when they were little (and loveable). For a few hours, it was nice. She was clean, warm, and full, in a safe place with her brother and sister. When their mother came home, she hugged her daughters and ignored her son, and brought out a bottle of vodka to propose a girly night in. It was either accept or get kicked out, so they drank up dutifully. 

It was slightly embarrassing when they all fell for a basic distraction spell of Gavroche’s, which he used to down half of Éponine’s drink, but even their mother wouldn’t go as far as to chuck an eleven year-old out on the street at two in the morning, so he was just smacked around the head and told to stop being a cheeky little shit. 

They fell asleep around three-thirty, all three of them sharing the pull-out sofa while their mother snored in her bedroom. “As days go,” Azelma murmured, a little drunk, “this wasn’t actually that bad.” 

“Mmmm,” Éponine agreed. 

“You busy tomorrow?” 

“Don’t think so.” 

“Gavroche?” 

“I can skip school.” 

“Why?” Éponine asked tiredly. 

“Because I’ve got fifty euros to burn, and I reckon we should go shopping.”

**Author's Note:**

> Ohhhhhhhhhh my god you would not believe how much time I spent on Google Maps for this goddamn fic. Fun fact: I feel compelled to make sure everywhere they go would be 100% feasible, mostly by walking it myself on streetview. This is so time consuming, you don't even know. -_- But on the upside, at least you now know that you can Google any of the places mentioned and see them for yourself! :D
> 
> If you enjoyed this, please consider [buying me a coffee!](https://ko-fi.com/A221HQ9) <3


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